C.I.A. Officials May Be Called to Testify

By MICHAEL WINES,

Published: July 13, 1991

WASHINGTON, July 12—
The Senate Intelligence Committee may call current and former officials of the Central Intelligence Agency to testify as it pursues growing questions about Robert M. Gates's role in the Iran-contra affair.

The scandal has clouded the nomination of Mr. Gates, who was deputy director of the agency when the affair came to light in 1986, to be the new Director of Central Intelligence.

Senate aides and other officials said in interviews today that lawmakers on the panel were increasingly distressed by disclosures that suggested that the agency's leaders had concealed their full knowledge of the affair from both the intelligence panel and from other Congressional investigators.

The committee has no evidence definitively showing that Mr. Gates knew of or concealed wrongdoing in the Iran-contra affair by either the C.I.A. or other Reagan Administration officials, said the aides, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Reluctance to Proceed

But in light of the admission this week of one top C.I.A. official, Alan D. Fiers Jr., that he withheld information from Congress, some senators on the panel are reluctant to proceed with Mr. Gates's confirmation hearings without conclusive evidence that Mr. Gates was not involved and that the agency is itself scandal free. .

"There's a feeling that they may have to haul the whole seventh floor down here" to resolve the questions, said one Congressional aide, referring to the C.I.A.'s executive offices atop its suburban Virginia headquarters.

The prospect that the committee's hearings on Mr. Gates's confirmation may be delayed by the disclosures of this week set off a long and unusually angry outburst from President Bush today at his retreat in Kennebunkport, Me.

Speaking to reporters at a photo session, Mr. Bush said the Intelligence Committee was about to "panic and run like a covey of quail because somebody has made an allegation against a man whose word I trust and who, as I understand it, hasn't been fingered by what's coming out of this process." Leaks and Closed Doors

"What is this system where we hear through some leaks in some newspaper that behind closed doors somebody has said something, and thus a lot of people run for cover?" Mr. Bush asked. "I have confidence in Gates, and if somebody wants to accuse him of something, the Senate is absolutely right in getting that determination made and asking for the evidence. But they ought not to have it obscured by some testimony that's been going on for four years. They ought not to accept a rumor."

The chairman of the committee, Senator David L. Boren, Democrat of Oklahoma, has suggested that the panel may want to seek testimony from Mr. Fiers and the C.I.A.'s former deputy director of operations, Clair E. George, before proceeding with hearings on Mr. Gates's nomination.

Mr. Fiers has told the independent prosecutor in the Iran-contra case that he acted on Mr. George's order when he concealed from Congress his knowledge of an operation run by Oliver L. North, a White House aide, to arm the Nicaraguan rebels.

Mr. Fiers's admissions and accusations reopened the question of who within the C.I.A. knew about the scandal, and have brought the hearings on Mr. Gates' nomination, once scheduled for Monday, to a halt. The issue of how to proceed is to be taken up by the Intelligence Committee on Tuesday. At the time the arms pipeline was in operation Mr. George was a subordinate of Mr. Gates. An Urging to Proceed

The vice chairman of the panel, Senator Frank H. Murkowski, Republican of Alaska, said in an interview today that he would urge that the hearings proceed despite the commitee's doubts.

Mr. Murkowski said the panel should proceed as far as it could with Mr. Gates's nomination before the Senate's scheduled recess on Aug. 2, including seeking testimony from Mr. Fiers and Mr. George.

Senator Boren said in a written statement that he had no objection to beginning hearings on Mr. Gates's nomination in July, but that he could not guarantee that the hearings would be completed before Congress begins its recess.

At the root of the intelligence committee's desire to delay the hearings is the realization, brought home by the furor over Mr. Fiers's revelations, that Mr. Gates's nomination is rapidly becoming a volatile political issue.

Some members of the panel feel that they cannot support Mr. Gates as long as any question exists about either his knowledge of the Iran-contra affair or his efforts to investigate it when he was Deputy Director and acting C.I.A. Director in 1986 and 1987, aides say. 2 C.I.A. Inquiries

The C.I.A. conducted both an internal legal inquiry and at least one inspector-general's investigation into its role in the Iran-contra affair, and its director, William H. Webster, disciplined or dismissed six C.I.A. employees in 1987, including Mr. Fiers, for violating the agency's own guidelines.

The C.I.A.'s inquiries did not implicate Mr. George, Mr. Gates or a number of other senior C.I.A. officials, many of them under cover, who either worked with Mr. North or were deeply involved in Iran or Central American operations. Since then, the agency has promoted at least four such officials to higher positions, intelligence officials have said. One of them, the agency's former Latin America division chief, was identified by his title in court documents filed by Mr. Walsh's lawyers this week.

Those documents show that Mr. Fiers told the official that Mr. North had raked off profits from the sale of arms to Iran and used some of the money to arm the Nicaragua rebels. Disturbed Over Tapes

Mr. Boren and Mr. Murkowski said today that they were further disturbed by reports today that the C.I.A. had taped hundreds of conversations between officials at its headquarters and agents in Central America, some of which provided information used by Mr. Walsh in his investigation.

Mr. Boren said that he did not believe that the Senate Iran-contra investigative committee, of which he was a member in 1987, had been told by the C.I.A. of the tapes' existence.

The chief lawyers for both the Senate and House Iran-contra committees, Arthur L. Liman of New York and John W. Nields Jr. of Washington, said in interviews today that they recalled receiving no tapes or transcripts despite being assured by the Agency that all materials relevant to Iran and the contras would be supplied.

This evening, however, an Administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the C.I.A. did provide selected transcripts of the conversations to both Congressional committees upon their request.

A C.I.A. spokesman, Mark Mansfield, issued a statement defending the Agency's cooperation with investigators. "For almost five years now, the Agency has responded fully and in a timely fashion to requests from both the oversight and the investigative committees of Congress that have examined this matter. We have fully cooperated and we will certainly continue to cooperate," he said.

Photo: President Bush critisized the prospect of a delay in Senate conformation hearings for Robert M. Gates as Director of Central Intelligence. Mr. Bush spoke to reporters yesterday yesterday at Kennebunkport, Me. (Associated Press)